At Fri, 17 Nov 2006 16:15:45 -0500 Shel Horowitz <shel at frugalfun.com> wrote: > > ** Be a Good Dobee and help the group, you must be counted to post . > ** Fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area. > > > It's been a few days of multiple yucky Internet problems and I am > hoping somebody out there can help me understand why this is > happening. > > My configuration: > > Main computer: iMac G4 running OS X 10.2.8, about four years old > Secondary computer: low-end HP PC running Windows XP Home, about two years old > Laptop: brand new Mac iBook running OS X 10.4 (Tiger), and prior to > that a five-year Mac laptop > > The two desktop computers connect via Ethernet cables to a DLink DI > 524 wireless router (about six months old) that is in turn cabled to > a Surfboard SB4100 cable modem, I think about four years old. The Mac > has a short cable because it's right next to the modem and router; > the PC is on the second floor and uses a cable maybe 20 feet long. > > There are two major and one minor problems we've been having: > > 1. Internet access: > The router is refusing to provide access to the Internet. I can get > the Internet on the desktop Mac by unplugging it from the router and > plugging it into the cable modem directly--*most* of the time. But > it's having more and more frequent outages even that way, sometimes > requiring restarting not only the modem but the computer. > > For the first time that I can remember (we've had similar problems > with routers and hubs before, have burned out several of them over > the years), we cannot get Internet access upstairs even by plugging > that cable directly into the modem. > > The laptop can recognize the wireless network but cannot access the > Internet over it. I have not tried cabling it in directly or taking > it to an Internet cafe. It sounds like you have a problem with your cable modem or something upstream -- you should check with your cable provider to make sure. Can your desktop machines talk to each other and/or with the laptop? If so, your router is OK. It is *possible* that your router is misconfigured. > > 2. Spam deluge > Until the other day, I was getting 200-300 spams in my spamfilter > (Spamfire 1.0) per day, and rescuing about 10 percent. Not all were > spam, but many were messages I didn't need from certain groups I > belong to (e.g., the programmer list for the community radio station > where I have a show). This week, it's been 600-800 a day, and I'm > still rescuing about 20 out of all that. It is high enough volume > that after every 100-200 that I delete, I quit the program and load > it again so that if it crashes, all the junk I got rid of doesn't > come back. > > The only thing that's changed in my setup is that I've stopped > aliasing and forwarding all my email to my ISP address (charter.net) > and am using the bluehost server on the Frugalfun account, inbound > and outbound, and I set up my wife's email to alias through the > Charter account here she has her own screen name. PrincipledProfit > email has for some time been using its own server for inbound and the > charter server for outbound. Sounds like you need a proper spam filter set up somewhere. SpamAssassin works pretty good. > > 3. Shopping cart confirmation messages and order info are disappearing. > > I use two different copies of the no-cost verison of mal's shopping > cart. When I get a cc order, it goes through one cart, and generates > an email message to me. When I get a paypal order (or a cc order for > an ebook), it goes to a different cart, that is supposed to send me > both the shopping cart confirmation and another confirmation from > paypal. But all of a sudden, the cart confirmation is not arriving, > and several of the paypal confirmations have a total that is not > represented by the product shown (invariably, AFAIC remember, they > have been for my forthcoming Grassroots Marketing for Authors and > Publishers, which has its own order page--so maybe that's where the > problem is). When i contact the customer, I discover that they have > ordered other prducts that aren't showing in the confirmation but do > show in the total. > > Also, a minor thing: the filter I ahve to mark these orders as > prioirty so I don't miss them still shows up in Eudora but hasn't > been working for a while. > > I don't know if these problems have anything to do with each other, > but I'd be very grateful for any guidance. > _______________________________________________ > Hidden-discuss mailing list - home page: http://www.hidden-tech.net > Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net > > You are receiving this because you are on the Hidden-Tech Discussion list. > If you would like to change your list preferences, Go to the Members > page on the Hidden Tech Web site. > http://www.hidden-tech.net/members > > -- Robert Heller -- 978-544-6933 Deepwoods Software -- Linux Installation and Administration http://www.deepsoft.com/ -- Web Hosting, with CGI and Database heller at deepsoft.com -- Contract Programming: C/C++, Tcl/Tk